Issue 280: Food Sovereignty and Autonomy

Submitted by Cathleen Kneen on April 1, 2011

Food Sovereignty and Autonomy

#280, April 2011

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Contrast between the call for agro-ecology as the key to realization of the right to food from Olivier de Schutter, UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, and the agenda unveiled in the Davos New Vision for Agriculture, with special focus on the plans for TanzaniaMarket and Subsistence: Actually, the price of rice is relatively stable -- because most rice is eaten where it is grownAutonomy in Practice: Community Managed Sustainable Agriculture is building soil health and feeding the people in Andhra Pradesh state, India And now, the bad news: TechnoServe is partnering with an impressive list of transnational food corporations to 'help' Haiti by developing a 'sustainable' mango export industryLeaves a bad taste: A NAFTA ruling gives Cargill a large chunk of cash ($77 million plus court costs) and permission to continue selling subsidized US-produced HFCS tax-free in Mexico An Energy Drink: Coke introduces a 'green' plastic bottle in Canada More Sweetness: Toronto (and Paris France) are better places to keep bees than Guelph, possibly because of their pesticide bans Naked Oats: Campbell's develops a super-nutritional product (designed for food banks) with a new version of oats developed in Canada's public labs Biotech Puffery and Propaganda: The Internaional Service for the Acquisition of Agribiotech Applications, usually referred to as ISAAA, and its writer Clive James, once more prove that their propaganda has no factual foundationMore Reliable Data on Biotech Crops: Actual facts (with references) are available from Friends of the Earth InternationalEditors' Note: We resent being forced to vote for a party we do not support in order to try to unseat a vicious right-wing MP.

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